


Dislocation

by quirkysubject



Series: Around, around, (around) [2]
Category: Queen (Band)
Genre: (not Scrabble), 1974 US Tour, Ageism, Anger, Brian May's 1974 Hepatitis Diagnosis, Comfort, Disappointment, Early Queen (Band), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Freddie Mercury POV, Friendship, Games, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, Hopeful Ending, Humour, Light Angst, Poor Brian doesn't deserve this, References to Illness, Song references, Touring, commiserating, early seventies, period-typical attitudes to women and mental health
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:55:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24551974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quirkysubject/pseuds/quirkysubject
Summary: May 16th 1974, somewhere above the Atlantic Ocean.Inspired by the prompt "That time Freddie couldn’t bear to be alone", although this time it’s all he wants.
Relationships: Freddie Mercury & Roger Taylor
Series: Around, around, (around) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1978174
Comments: 29
Kudos: 63
Collections: Freddie Mercury Weekend 2020!





	Dislocation

The dull artificial light inside the plane is grating on his eyes, sending frissons of pain into his skull. Or perhaps it’s the bone dry, icy blast shooting out of the air conditioning, or the unrelenting drone of the engines. Everything, from the stomach-turning vibrations of the plane to the musty plastic smell of the cheap seat covers, tells him that he shouldn’t be here. That he doesn’t _belong_ here. 

He belongs on the stage of the Municipal Auditorium in Charleston, South Carolina, making a bunch of rubes - who would ordinarily sneer at his clothes, his hair, his _name_ \- worship him by the end of their 40-minute set. 

(Actually - and he’s meticulously keeping track of that in the back on his mind even as his ego rails against the unfairness of the world - he doesn’t belong _there_ either. The 1000-seaters and town halls and bloody cow sheds are a mere stepping stone, as unpleasant as they are necessary.)

Instead, his place is being usurped by some American band no one has ever heard of. Envy and frustration make for a bitter taste in the back of his mouth. Or perhaps it’s just the aftertaste of that atrocity that had been served as dinner.

Freddie curls deeper into his seat, his side pressed into the backrest, knees drawn up to his chest. The unforgiving satin of his trousers bites uncomfortably into his thighs. For a moment he wishes he would have just put on his oldest, most washed out and comfortable pair of denims, but no. Cancelled tour or not, that just wouldn’t do. What if there happens to be press at Heathrow?

He squeezes his eyes shut and wills sleep to come, to whisk him away from all this misery even if only for a few minutes. 

Rustling and movement in the aisle tell him someone breached the perimeter he imposed with glares and huffs and impatient waves of his hand as soon as they got on the - mercifully empty - plane. He doesn’t want sympathy. He doesn’t want to be coddled and pitied and - worst of all - cheered up. There’s a reason he holed himself up at the very back of the plane, and it’s not so _people_ can get in his face. 

Someone sits down in the seat on the other side of the aisle with a soft exhale of breath and the timbre, the tone, the sheer _attitude_ in it is enough to tell him exactly who it is. 

The only one who would dare sit there even when Freddie has made it abundantly clear company is not tolerated. Or rather, one of two, but the other one is currently too weak to walk on his own. 

Well, if Roger’s looking for entertainment, he’s bang out of luck, because Freddie is sleeping. Or as good as. Maybe if he pretends long enough, he will actually fall asleep. Or Roger will just go away, he gets bored easily. That would be for the best really. Freddie doesn’t want anyone close, especially not Roger with his quick temper and quicker smiles. 

He burrows deeper into the too-thin blanket and tries to banish from his mind all thought of his bothersome bandmate. 

Whose feet are tapping out a listless rhythm against the seat in front of him. Who is reading a magazine in the absolute loudest and most obnoxious manner possible. Who is _humming_ bloody _Tiger Feet_ , what the fuck is _wrong_ with him? 

Freddie only realises he’s given up all pretence of being asleep when blue eyes meet his and a can of beer is waved in his face. 

“Want one? It’s shit, but it’s cold.” Roger acts as if this were a party. A party he is invited to, at that, when really he is intruding on Freddie's solitude in the rudest possible manner. 

But he can't very well pretend to be sleeping now, so Freddie just keeps on glaring at Roger.

Roger takes a drink from his own can. “Alright, be like that. But I’ll take full advantage of free drinks as long as we get them.”

The thought that Sheffield is paying for it makes him reach out for the can. He grimaces at the first sip. Beer is not his preferred drink anyway, but somehow it tastes even worse 25.000 feet in the air. 

“How is he”, Freddie asks, because it seems wrong not to, and nods towards the front where Brian is sitting surrounded by worried-looking minders, John just one row behind. 

Apart from the band and their minimal crew, the second-class section of the plane is almost empty. If he squints, he can almost imagine it had been chartered just for them. But the handful of travellers scattered across the middle section spoils that vision. 

“Sleeping. Still looking like a curry.”

Freddie snorts, then quickly calls himself to heel and composes himself. That’s exactly why he wanted to be left alone. He doesn’t _want_ his mood improved. The situation is horrible, _everything_ is horrible. And now that scoundrel doesn’t even let him wallow in his well-deserved self-pity. 

“They say he’ll be confined at the hospital”, Roger goes on. “Four weeks at least. Maybe six.”

Freddie clicks his fingernails against the beer can. The polish already looks chipped. “D’you reckon he’ll be alright?” 

Something had been wrong with Brian most of the year, ever since that blasted trip to Australia. _Go home you Pommie poofters_. Bloody louts. And yet, despite everything, they’d won them over in the end. He’d seen it, _felt_ it in his bones, the moment the tide turned.

Just like it had here. Every night they’d gone on stage, facing a crowd that had never heard of them before, a crowd that was waiting for them to fuck off and let Mott play already.

But Queen are not just another support act. Queen don’t stumble on stage after a fumbling announcement by the local promoter. Queen are heralded by _Procession_ and emerge in a flash of light, a halo of dry ice. 

By the time they get to _Liar_ , even the hardened Mott fans have stopped yelling for them to piss off. At _Keep Yourself Alive_ , the first five rows are singing along to the chorus. And by the end of their set, there’s always at least a handful of people clamouring for an encore. 

And when that happens, when he comes back on stage to the dramatic drum rolls of Big Spender, he knows he’s got them in the palm of his hand. They’re shouting his name, following his every move. If it weren’t for Mott giving them dirty looks from the wings, he could have gone on playing forever.

He could tell Mott were getting nervous about them. They didn’t say it but everyone could see that on the next tour, their places might be reversed. It’s not that Mott are bad, far from it. They’re a perfectly good rock’n’roll band. 

But they’re not Queen. 

“Of course he will be”, Roger says. 

Freddie blinks a few times. What is Roger talking about? Oh right. Brian. Freddie feels a bit rotten. Their friend getting better, that’s what he should be worried about. “Good”, he says and offers the closest thing to a smile he can muster. But immediately, his thoughts drift off again. 

Because it wasn’t just Mott noticing them. That last day in New York, right before Brian collapsed, Jack had told them that the album had actually charted in the US! Only in the low hundreds, but they still had almost three weeks of touring ahead of them. A top 100 result was guaranteed, perhaps even top 50, _top 30_ … And once their album was in the charts, more people would have come to the shows just for them, would have cheered their names before they even came up on stage, would have carried them through the set with their adoration. And he would have given them _everything_ , his heart and body and soul. 

But it’s ruined, everything is _ruined_ , because Brian couldn’t keep it together just that little bit longer. 

“But it’ll be a while until we can play together again”, Roger goes on “And who knows when he’ll be well enough for a proper tour or a-”

“I fucking hate him”, Freddie explodes and kicks the seat in front of him. He hugs himself tighter and screws his eyes shut, presses his lips tightly together, as he waits for Roger’s pushback. _Christ, why are you such an arsehole, Fred? He’s sick, he isn’t doing it on purpose!_

As if Freddie doesn’t know that. He’s being unfair, he _knows_ he’s being unfair, but everything’s being unfair to him, too! Brian had hidden and downplayed the pain he must have been in the whole time. They had all seen how worn out he looked, but blamed it on the touring, the parties, the stress of being away from home. (And - Freddie notes with petty exactitude - it hadn’t kept Brian from making off with some dancing girl in New Orleans two nights in a row.) 

For four days after Brian had keeled over, they’d held out hope. The shows in the South had to be cancelled, but the doctors said that after a week of rest they might be able to continue with the Midwest and Canada concerts - Detroit, Chicago, Toronto… God, he wants to play there so badly it hurts. And they were so close! So close he can taste it!

Waiting had been agony. Concerned visits to Brian’s bedside, who kept making brave faces and promising he was feeling better already, only to throw up the half slice of toast he ate as proof of his recovery half an hour later. Seeing their manager rushing about, always between phone calls, trying to reassure them with platitudes but never actually telling them anything. Trying to go out and have a good time at night, although it just wasn’t the same without Mott and their connections and the buzz of a tour in full swing carrying them along. 

But all the time, they never stopped hoping for a miracle. Until today when they’d been rushed to JFK because it turned out it was definitely hepatitis and the execs had grown scared Brian and everyone he’d been in contact with might be quarantined in the US. It would have meant hospital bills and hotel rooms for all of them, for a month or longer, and all that while they’re not playing shows or producing music like the good little worker ants they’re supposed to be. There wouldn’t have been any _return on investment_.

Freddie knows it’s not Brian’s fault, it’s not _anyone’s_ fault, but all he wants to do is to march up to the front of the plane, shake Brian from his precious sleep and lay into him, to unload all his fury and his disappointment and his bitterness where it belongs. 

Obviously, he can’t do that, so perhaps a fight with Roger - so loyal, so protective of his friends - is the second-best option. 

But Roger just grins humourlessly and raises his beer in a mock salute. “Cheers.” When he sees Freddie’s disbelieving expression, he shrugs. “What? If he didn’t look two steps away from the brink I’d fucking strangle him myself. Tosser.”

Freddie takes another sip of his beer, feeling deflated. Now that Roger isn’t giving him the pushback he’s spoiling for, his anger melts into a gloomy misery. “I just can’t believe he’s doing this to us”, he sighs. 

“Yeah. And it was all going so great, too”, Roger says. “They were all cheering for us on Broadway. For you.” 

Freddie’s mind drifts back to some of the shows they played. “Remember Portland, when we had to come back for two encores?”

Roger grins. “Ian looked like he was about to strangle us when they finally let us off stage. Or the standing ovation after _Keep Yourself Alive_ in, where was it... Harrisburg?”

“Providence.” Freddie will never forget that show for as long as he lives. “And that was you. You were on fire that night. Brian too”, he adds wistfully.

“We all were.” Roger leans back in his seat and closes his eyes. It should look peaceful, but it doesn’t. Not one bit. “God, what wouldn’t I give to be on that stage right now.”

Freddie’s throat goes tight and he swallows hard to keep the emotions threatening to spill over inside. “Instead it’s bloody Minnesota or whatever they’re called.” 

Roger snorts and gives him a bit of side-eye. “Come on, you know they’re called Kansas.”

Oh, what does it matter? “They can call themselves West Nevada for all I care.”

“That’s not even a… ah, forget it. You’re right.” Roger scowls so hard it borders on parody. “Bloody Minnesota”, he growls.

They empty their beer cans to that.

“We’ll come back though”, Roger says, studying the image on the can as if it held an oracle to his future. “And not as a support act, I promise you that.”

He says it with such conviction that Freddie almost believes it. It’s one of those things about him. Where Brian gets tangled up in all the problematic details and John exudes quiet scepticism, Roger just drives them forward. Although he might not always know where they’re going. 

But it doesn’t work this time. For all his displays of confidence, Freddie knows as well as anyone that bands don’t get second and third chances thrown at them. Too many other hopefuls, too great the financial risk. They had their chance to prove themselves in the biggest market in the world. And they’ve blown it. 

Roger has turned to him, a slight frown on his face. Apparently, sullen silence is not the response he expected from Freddie. “What is it?”

This is the time for Freddie to shake is head and crack a joke or tell Roger to fuck off and kindly leave him alone. But what comes out of his mouth is something very different. “What if that was it?” 

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous!” Roger gets out his pack of Marlboros and - after lighting one for himself - offers it to Freddie. 

He doesn’t smoke, not usually, too concerned it might mess with his voice, the one thing even his detractors have to admit is worthwhile about him. But what the hell, with Brian down for the count, who knows when - _if_ \- they’re even going to play again. 

He lets Roger light one for him. It chokes him a bit, the smoke too harsh for his unaccustomed lungs. It tastes awful, like giving up. 

Oh well, now that he’s started talking, he might as well go all the way. “I’m going to turn 28 this year”, he says. 

“So what?” 

“That’s almost thirty! That’s ancient, I might as well be dead!” 

Roger rolls his eyes. “Aren’t you being a liiiiiiittle dramatic? I mean, I know this is _you_ we’re talking about, but-”

“McCartney was already through the whole ‘rise to fame - superstardom - band breakup’-cycle at 28.”

“McCartney who?” 

Freddie ignores Roger’s pathetic attempt at humour. 

Roger cocks his head and tries another approach. “You realise you sound like a girl that hasn’t found her man before the dreaded three-zero?”

Freddie take a short puff and blows out the smoke straight away, skipping the horrible inhaling part. “Easy for you to say. You’re not even 25. And you’re just a drum-” 

Even as riled up as he is, Freddie realises he’s on a dangerous path. After four years in a band together, they all know each other’s ‘too far’. 

“I mean”, he repeats quickly, to ward off Roger’s narrowed eyes and thinning lips, “you only get better with experience. And you’re hidden behind the kit most of the time. There are plenty of other bands - _good_ bands - that would kill to take you on. But who would want a frontman who’s positively geriatric?”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Instead of being calmed down, Roger sounds genuinely angry now. “What are you talking about, 'other bands'? We don’t need other bands.” 

“I don’t mean…” It’s only now that Freddie realises that yes, he actually does. He is already seeing it so clearly. EMI pulling out. Trident dropping them. John and Roger, the 'sonic volcano', courted by a band that has already made it, or that is poised and ready to pounce, who have a guitarist who doesn’t falter every time they leave the country and a sprightly young lead singer who doesn’t have to pout at the cameras just to hide his teeth. “I’m just saying that if-”

“No! Shut up. No ifs. Not from you too!” 

Alarms sound off like sirens in Freddie’s head. “How do you mean, ‘you too’? Has someone said something to you? Jack or one of the Elektra people or…”

“What, no!” Roger’s completely turned towards him now. “But Brian was all ‘go on without me, take on a session guitarist ekcetera ekcetera’ when I sat with him last night.” His expression is thunderous. “I thought he was simply delirious, but apparently that sort of idiocy is making the rounds if it gets to you too.”

“I’m serious, Rog. We’ve been trying for four years now. Every time we thought, this is it, this is our break, something happened and the album flopped or the tour was a disaster or…”

“Who are you and what have you done with my lead singer?” Roger crosses his arms and glares daggers at him. “The last album didn’t flop! The single - _your_ single - didn’t flop! It was a top ten hit! The tour was brilliant and…”

“...and now it’s over and we can’t play for a month at least and sales are already slumping!” 

“There’ll be new songs!” Roger voice is very high now, the way it always gets when he’s just about to blow up. “I know you, I bet you’re already cooking up something brilliant.”

Freddie shakes his head and throws the fag end into his beer can where it burns out with a hiss. The smell is disgusting. 

Roger just doesn’t get it. Freddie’s been trying to do exactly that the whole time they were doomed to idleness and waiting for Brian to recover. He tried to work on some ideas he’s had before, that weren’t quite ready for the last album, or to use his experiences of the US tour to write something new. But it was all stale and bland and trite, lyrical cliches heaped upon musical banality. “Oh, I can’t write songs anymore - I’m all dried up! Like a, like a cactus in the desert”, he declares.

“Cacti don’t dry up”, Roger says, as if that has got anything to do with Freddie’s point. “That’s why they thrive in deserts.”

“Oh, forget about the bloody cacti! Roger, the moment we stop making them money, Trident will spit us out like a chewed up piece of gum.”

“We _are_ making them money”, Roger yells. “The album has been in the charts for weeks! And the single too! The Sheffields are raking it in while they’re sitting on their fat arses!” 

Freddie presses his lips together. Roger’s got a point. While they were forced to share hotel rooms and only allowed two long-distance calls home a week, the Sheffield brothers drove everywhere in their brand-new Rolls Royce, the greedy, blood-sucking leeches. 

“They’d be idiots to drop us now”, Roger continues. “Because we made an impression. We’ve got an album in the charts in the US. We’re going to come back. And we’re not going to play cow sheds.”

“Ah, please darling, don’t remind me.” That gig had been the low point. The _smell_ in that thing…

“We’re going to headline at Uris Theatre next year. No, scrap that, we’re going to headline at Madison Square Garden. Twice.” 

This time, Freddie can’t help a weak smile at his friend’s sheer audacity. Usually, he can keep up with it. Hell, most days he can one-up him even, coming up with more and more outrageous visions of their looming superstardom. 

“There we go.” Roger looks so pleased with himself, Freddie immediately rearranges his features back into a scowl.

Because no matter the nice words and the positive thinking, Freddie is still old and sitting in the back of a scheduled flight with a seriously ill guitar player and an bleak future ahead of him. 

“Nope, none of that. Come on.” Roger turns completely so his back is to the window and his feet in the aisle. He stretches out his hands towards Freddie, palms facing up.

“No way”, Freddie says and tucks his hands under his armpits. He’s certainly not going to play Slapsies with his drummer. He’s depressed, but he’s not mental. 

“It’ll cheer us up!”

“It’ll cheer _you_ up.” Roger loves that stupid game. He’s good at it too, which is why he’s always running out of people willing to play it with him. 

“That’s a start, isn’t it?” Roger’s grin is blinding. Those perfect fucking teeth. 

Freddie shakes his head. “I’m not playing with you. I saw what you did to Peter.”

Roger shrugs. “He could have quit at any time.” His face looks positively evil for a second. “And it’s good for the reflexes. Come on.”

“My reflexes are _fine_.”

But Roger is not so easily deterred. “You can start.” He turns his hands so the palms face downwards. 

“You always say that.” And then whoever is dumb enough to agree is in for a world of pain. But Freddie’s known Roger for five years now. You don’t survive that long without developing a bit of immunity against those big blue eyes and their innocent, pleading looks. 

Roger just grins and brings his hands a little closer to Freddie. “How about I do it with my eyes closed.”

Alright, that’s it. That’s the kind of hubris he just can’t let him get away with. Before he can think too hard about what he’s doing, Freddie has placed his palms against Roger’s, lightly pressing against them from below. He purses his lips in concentration. 

“Go on then”, Roger says and closes his eyes. His lashes flutter against his cheeks and Freddie’s convinced that he’s blinking, the fucking cheater. He thinks he’s got Freddie ensnared in his trap, right where he wants him. 

Instead of looking at their hands, Freddie keeps his eyes of Roger’s face. He looks a bit tired, as they all do, and there’s a hint of stubble on his chin. He still looks like he could walk straight into a photo shoot for a flashy magazine, the prat. And how are his hands always so warm?

As Freddie moves, Roger’s hands fall away to the sides to evade him, but that’s not what Freddie’s aiming at. Roger flinches back, but too late: the back of Freddie’s middle finger flicks him squarely on the nose. 

He jumps back, eyes flying open. “Hey!” 

Roger looks so adorably offended as he scrunches his nose and bats Freddie’s hand away that Freddie just can’t help it. Laughter irresistibly bubbles up in him and he presses one hand to his mouth and the other to his chest as the giggles ripple through him, filling him with a warmth he hasn’t felt in days. 

“What the fuck was that?” Roger can barely keep the scowl on his face, but he tries admirably.

Freddie holds his hands up at his sides innocently, palms falling open. “Ah, just a flick of the wrist, dear.”

Roger stares at him for a second, mouth hanging open in disbelief, his eyes wandering between Freddie’s hands and his face. And just when Freddie thinks he’s about to receive the reddest set of hands of his life, Roger cracks up. “You… I’ll make you pay for that”, he grits out in between giggles, completely failing at the menacing growls he’s aiming for.

“Of course you will”, Freddie says generously. 

“Mark my words.” Roger stabs a pointy fingertip right in the middle of Freddie’s chest. Then he holds out his hand, expression positively bloodthirsty. "Alright then. Keep going." 

Freddie does nothing of the sort. He won't get away with something like that again. "I'll forfeit", he says and turns away from Roger. _Just a flick of the wrist._

Roger tries to goad him back into playing for a while, but then settles back in his seat, picking up the magazine again. “Ruddy cheater,” he grumbles, but there's a hint of a smile on his face. 

Freddie sits back as well, the blanket pushed aside for now, grinning as he savours his moment of triumph. _Just a flick of the wrist and a dig in the ribs, a kick in the head and a… and a…_ He yawns as the last giggles subside, leaving a stretched but somehow contented feeling in its wake. There’s something there, but right now his brain is too sluggish to dig it up.

Next to him, Roger has gone back to flipping noisily through the pages of Rolling Stone. 

Freddie closes his eyes and allows himself to be lulled into a drowse by the comforting hum of the engines. The words slip away, but for once, he doesn’t get anxious about it.

They’ll come back. And when they do, he’ll be here for them.

**Author's Note:**

>   
> Our budding superstars on that tour (Boston, 26 April 1974).
> 
> So many people to thank: @plainxte for her comments and suggestions and @guiltypleasurefandomface for helping me out with the slapsies. Also, @onegoldenglance, @rushingheadlong and @his-majesty-king-mercury on tumblr for digging up so much info on that 1974 tour. 
> 
> Also, a thousand kudos and thanks to @nastally for conceiving and organising this wonderful week!
> 
> The cowshed-story (and Freddie being pissed off about it) is from Norman Sheffield’s book, so… grain of salt ;)
> 
> There’s an excellent recording of the [Portland show](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24_sSI5VA_Y) that gives a good impression of Queen on their first America tour. Including Procession, Big Spender and Bama Lama Bama Loo! 
> 
> And finally, here’s an [introduction to slapsies](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOrpPrLAmUk) xD (Although I grew up playing the "praying hands" variant)


End file.
